Hlinka Guard

The Hlinka Guard was the paramilitary wing of the Slovak People's Party from 1938 to 1945. The party was named after the party's founder Andrej Hlinka, and the guard operated against Jews, Czechs, Hungarians, leftists, and political opponents. The guard attracted recruits from all walks of life, and Alexander Mach became the leader of the guard on 15 March 1939, the date of Slovakia's independence from Czechoslovakia. Starting in 1941, Hlinka Guard members were trained at SS camps in Nazi Germany, with most of its members being Slovak peasants and low-skilled labors; most of the middle-class guards quit. In 1942, the Hlinka Guard assisted in the deportation of Jews to the Auschwitz concentration camp in Poland, and the guard's members prospered financially from confiscating Jewish possessions. After the Slovak National Uprising of 1944, the SS took over the Hlinka Guard and suited it for its own purposes, sending its POHG unit to hunt partisans and Jews. After the war, members of the guard were punished with 5- to 20-year prison sentences.